The pathologically excessive greed of progressives ensures that if free market space travel really takes off, it won’t launch from the Land Ruled by Fruits and Nuts:

The earthly convention of paying taxes may soon extend into outer space, if California regulators have anything to say about it.

The state’s Franchise Tax Board is seeking public comment on its proposal for computing taxes on commercial space transportation companies. …

It would apply to companies that use California as a launchpad, not California companies launching from other states, like Texas or Florida. …

SpaceX, which is headquartered in Hawthorne (Los Angeles County), declined to comment.

John Logsdon, a professor emeritus at George Washington University, states the obvious:

“States that don’t levy taxes would have that competitive advantage over states that do,” Logsdon said. “If California puts in a tax and Florida or Texas doesn’t have a similar tax, I’m not sure that helps California in a competitive way.”

Sure enough,

At least one company has already been lured away from California… Moon Express, a company working to mine the moon for natural resources, moved from Mountain View to Florida.

No worries. When the commercial spaceflight industry abandons California because it is not profitable to do business there, Governor Moonbeam can just jack up taxes even higher on those who remain behind. Soon California tax rates will shoot past the SpaceX rockets as they climb through the stratosphere.

I was going to initially comment that it’s too late for April fools (April 1) or May Fools (May 1 – better known as Mayday..) but then again it’s the People’s Republic of Kalifornia… and every day is that condition.

Living Arrangements in the Workers’ Paradise
In a centrally planned socialist economy like the one that existed in the Soviet Union, the government determined every detail of the national economy. This also meant that it determined the details of its workers’ personal lives, including where they lived, what jobs they took up, and where they could move. The Soviet Union had extensive restrictions on the freedom of movement that ranged from internal passports and residence restrictions to the forcible deportation and resettlement of entire peoples.
[..]
Internal passports were just one of the many tools of control that Soviet state security used to enact Stalin’s murderous purges of the late 1930s. By 1953, all non-rural residents were required to have passports, and in 1969 rural dwellers were allowed them as well, so that by the 1970s, passports and propiska were the regime’s standard tool for controlling the movement of the citizenry. Disobeying these laws invited charges of “vagabondage.”
[..]
Stifling rules and bureaucratic regulations were unfortunately not the sum of the Soviet Union’s restrictions on free movement. Some of its most horrifying acts involved snatching people—individual dissidents, social classes, entire ethnicities—and exiling and imprisoning them thousands of miles away from their homes. In the 1930s, NKVD squads deported all ethnic Koreans from the Russian Far East. During the Second World War, hundreds of thousands of Volga Germans, Karachai, Kalmyks, Chechens, Ingush, Crimean Tatars and others were deported to Central Asia or Siberia, often dropped off in areas with no housing whatsoever. From the 1930s to 1950s, millions passed through the GULAG prison camp system, which peaked at 2.5 million inmates in 1950. Even after Stalin’s death and the end of the era of mass slave labor, released prisoners were forced to live 101 kilometers outside the limits of major cities.

Soviet citizens got the worst of both worlds from their communist system. It was not actually able to provide them with abundant, high-quality housing. But it was fully able to exert totalitarian control over them, carefully track their location, restrict their movement, expel them from the locations they wanted to live, imprison them, or deport them to forbidding wastelands. So much for the “realm of freedom” promised by Marx.http://blog.victimsofcommunism.org/living-arrangements-in-the-workers-paradise/

And that is EXACTLY why no company will ever bring any lucrative space launch business to California while this sort of nonsense occurs.

So each time this nonsense happens, California and Californians lose – even those who know better than to vote for moonbats. Unfortunately with all the illegal immigrants voting and the dead voting – along with other Democrat voter fraud schemes that are in place – this isn’t going to change soon.

So what’s the deal with Cinco de Mayo? Ask most people and they say it’s Mexico’s July 4th, Mexico’s Independence Day… and they would be wrong.

Mexico’s Independence Day was September 16, 1810.

Cinco de Mayo isn’t as widely celebrated in Mexico as it is here. Cinco de Mayo celebrates the Mexican defeat over the French on May 5th 1862 during the Battle of Puebla in the Franco-Mexican war. So it’s a big deal in Puebla, not so much in the rest of Mexico, though it is recognized. Think of us celebrating some battle that happened during the Revolutionary War perhaps. I don’t know of any that are widely celebrated here.

And the real irony is despite the Mexican forces’ victory at Puebla, the French campaign was ultimately a success, at least temporarily, resulting in the short-lived Second Mexican Empire headed by Emperor Maximilian I.

Some historians have suggested that, had the Mexican resistance not persisted, the French might have felt free to back the Confederacy in the U.S. Civil War playing out at roughly the same time, and possibly altered the course of U.S. history.

And before the 1960s it wasn’t really heard of here – that’s when Chicano activists,the same ones who believe in Azatlan (a mythical place that never existed and never will, supposedly the ancestral home of the Aztecs that made up much of the southwest in the United States, but the Aztecs were never in what is now the United States) and who want to break off much of the United States to recreate this imaginary place – you know, just like the “palestinians”, who forget that there never was a country with that name, actually. Their efforts sowed the seeds but really it took more than that to get this going.

The party-filled Cinco de Mayo Americans celebrate today didn’t become popular until U.S. beer companies began targeting the Spanish-speaking population in the 1970s and 1980s, This campaign also ended up attracting other non Hispanic persons and morphed into the fake holiday we have today. Kind of a Mexican Kwanzaa.

Basically Cinco de Mayo is a holiday for everybody who drinks to get drunk on – just another excuse to kill brain cells. For those who don’t drink it’s an opportunity to celebrate Mexican culture and go try American invented recipes claimed to be from Mexico along with authentic Mexican fare.

According to the U.S. Census, the Hispanic population of the U.S. as of July 1, 2015 was 56.6 million — 17.6 percent of the country’s total population.

And of the Hispanic population in 2015, 63.4 percent were of Mexican origin.

And of that, by now, I’d guess that 1/3 to 1/2 are here illegally, though the official numbers are probably lower, probably closer to 1/6 or 1/5.

I always prefer to look things up when I don’t know them… so here is the count from various sources:

U.S. Border Patrol Local 2544 stated in July of 2005:

“There are currently 15 to 20 million illegal aliens in this country by many estimates, but the real numbers could be much higher and the numbers increase every day because our borders are not secure (no matter what the politicians tell you—don’t believe them for a second).

Even though it is quite clear that huge numbers of illegal aliens sneak into our country and avoid capture at our border, the media as well as government agencies seem quite content to under-report these numbers. The static official estimates are somewhat suspect.

15.7 million to 19.7 million illegal aliens in the U.S. today (and “today” is not well defined, but if you read the article it has to be from 2016 or later based on what it says)

and

Alternative methodologies conclude that between 20 million and 40 million illegal aliens have evaded apprehension and live in the United States.

They go on to state:

The analysis by James H. Walsh notes that estimates compiled by the U.S. Census Bureau (USCB), national surveys, governmental agencies, philanthropic organizations, religious charities, nongovernment statistics-keeping agencies, and immigrant advocates range from 7 million to 20 million illegal aliens. Walsh concludes that the number is closer to 2 times 20 million, or 40 million. The U.S. Census Bureau routinely undercounts and then adjusts upward total census numbers of Hispanics and other foreign nationals residing in the United States––counting only, of course, those willing to be counted. For the year 2000, the Census Bureau reported a total U.S. population count of “about 275 million” men, women, and children. When the states and local governments challenged that number as an undercount, the total was corrected upward to 281.4 million, with no clear count of illegal aliens. The Hispanic 2000 census count was 32.8 million, but on re-count the Census Bureau adjusted this number upward to 35.3 million, a 13 percent increase.

Journeymen Border Patrol agents (on the job five years or more) estimate that a minimum of five illegal aliens enter the United States for each apprehension, and more likely seven. My estimate of 38 million illegal aliens residing in the United States is calculated, however, using a conservative annual rate of entry (allowing for deaths and returns to their homelands) of three illegal aliens entering the United States for each one apprehended. My estimate includes apprehensions at the Southern Border (by far, the majority), at the Northern Border, along the Pacific, Atlantic, and Gulf of Mexico coasts, and at seaports and airports. Taking the DHS average of 1.2 million apprehensions per year and multiplying it by 3 comes to 3.6 million illegal entries per year; then multiplying that number by 10 for the 1996–2005 period, my calculations come to 36 million illegal entries into the United States. Add to this the approximately 2 million visa overstays during the same period, and the total is 38 million illegal aliens currently in the United States.

And keep in mind this does NOT consider the floods that came in during the Obama administration and his efforts to hide both the true numbers and where they were settled.

Others do not seem to see the problem as being quite so bad – example:

FAIR’s estimate of the illegal alien population in 2010 is slightly higher than that of the Pew estimate, i.e., 11.9 million. FAIR’s estimate of the number of illegal aliens in the workforce — using the share estimate of the Pew study — is similarly slightly higher, i.e., about 8.5 million jobs encumbered by illegal alien workers.

However this number is from 2010, six years ago, and notably is only an ESTIMATE of those IN THE WORKFORCE – consider that for every one in the workforce there could be any of the following: A wife, children, relatives, friends etc., who are here with them.

…the most current data available about immigrants in the United States, who numbered 43.3 million people in 2015.

Right off the bat you have to wonder about this one, because other sources put the number of IMMIGRANTS (not illegal, but all) higher. Significantly higher, despite the fact this data is now going on 2 years old. Or have more than 13,000,000 immigrants come into the U.S. in the past year and a few months? That’s hard to believe, to me. Then again, it was the period of time Obama was doing his best to import as many perpetual Democrats as he could.

This site seems to give one of the lowest estimates of illegal immigrants on a sub-page:

An estimated 11.4 million unauthorized immigrants resided in the United States as of January 2012 compared to 11.5 million in January 2011, according to the most recent estimates issued by the DHS Office of Immigration Statistics. These results suggest little to no change in the unauthorized immigrant population from 2011 to 2012.

The Migration Policy Institute estimated 11 million unauthorized immigrants resided in the United States in 2014. More than half (54 percent) resided in four states: California (27 percent), Texas (13 percent), New York (8 percent), and Florida (6 percent). The vast majority (81 percent) of unauthorized immigrants resided in 171 counties with 10,000 or more unauthorized immigrants each, of which the top five—Los Angeles County, CA; Harris County, TX; Cook County, IL; Orange County, CA; and Queens County, NY—accounted for 21 percent of all unauthorized immigrants.

I challenge some of their numbers, but they do give some fascinating information that I trust may be valid. I also challenge the claim, below, that the drop in apprehensions has anything to do with a drop in illegal immigration. Rather I put it all on a shift from a policy of actual immigration law enforcement to a policy of illegal immigration encouragement as a means to gain permanent political advantage.

The number of apprehensions has been decreasing in recent years due to the drop in illegal immigration and shifts in U.S. immigration enforcement priorities during the Obama administration. There were 462,388 apprehensions in 2015 and 530,250 in 2016 by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the two agencies within DHS responsible for the identification and removal of inadmissible noncitizens. By comparison, 662,483 apprehensions occurred in 2013 and 679,996 in 2014.

The Border Patrol reported 337,117 apprehensions in 2015 (73 percent of all apprehensions) and 415,816 in 2016 (78 percent of total), a significant drop from 486,651 in 2014. Almost all (98 percent) Border Patrol apprehensions in 2015 occurred along the Southwest border.

Additionally, ICE made 125,271 administrative arrests in 2015 (27 percent of total apprehensions) and 114,434 in 2016 (22 percent of total). Both represented a decrease from prior years (241,694 in 2013 and 193,345 in 2014).

The leading countries of nationality of those apprehended in 2015 were Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras. Nationals from these four countries composed 93 percent of all apprehensions. Despite rapid growth in previous years, apprehensions of Guatemalan, Salvadoran, and Honduran nationals in 2015 decreased 31 percent, 35 percent, and 60 percent respectively compared to 2014. Although Mexican nationals constituted more than half (58 percent) of apprehensions in 2015, their number dropped to the lowest level in the past decade, amounting to roughly one-quarter of the 1.1 million apprehensions in 2005.

From what I’ve read, and I posted about it once here on Moonbattery, at one point the Obama administration was supposedly at least considering picking up illegal aliens (i.e. the children of both illegal aliens and those who had initially come here illegally but were under various illegal Obama administration programs to become legal) in various countries south of ours and flying them here.

A new State Department and Department of Homeland Security Program will fly immigrant children from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador to their parents in the U.S. for free.

Parents can apply to have their children picked up and flown over the border to them on the taxpayer’s dime.

Any permanent resident, parolee or illegal immigrant granted or in the process of being granted a work permit under President Barack Obama’s executive order or his deferred action policy, who have children under age 21 living in Honduras, Guatemala or El Salvador can apply for the program, The Daily Caller reported.

If the application is approved, the child will be granted special refugee status and flown to the U.S. to receive “resettlement assistance” and will be eligible for taxpayer benefits. If the child has children of their own under 21 they can come into the U.S. too, along with parents of the child who is married to the applicant.

And the illicit and illegal use of taxpayer dollars wasted on illegal immigrants didn’t end there:

There’s also a propaganda piece on immigration at George Soros’ “Center for American Progress” which I won’t bother linking and don’t recommend you bother looking for or reading, but just to be fair I will mention it so you can if you wish.

Naturally they claim, with supposedly 2017 data, that the number of illegal aliens in the U.S. is a paltry 11.1 million.

And of course they call them “unauthorized migrants”.

Compare and contrast this with the claim that, back in 2006:

The Pew Hispanic Center, a nonpartisan research organization in Washington, estimates 11.5 million to 12 million “unauthorized migrants” live in the US today. It bases its numbers on the “Current Population Survey,” a monthly assessment of about 50,000 households jointly conducted by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Census Bureau.

Or so it is routinely reported, always followed by retractions because it was just a hoax. As far as I know, and I haven’t checked since the last hoax a month or so ago, he’s still alive and reasonably well for a man his age.

But you know, even after he dies he’s going to continue voting Democrat – all the dead in California do!

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There is plenty of enticing room in Arizona and Nevada for them to relocate to. More business friendly conditions too. Smooth thinking Socialist/Marxist California Democrats…we didn’t need these path breaking businesses in our state anyway. Morons…